Kmart has reinvented the Blue Light Special and it’s… well, a bit blue.  Perhaps too blue for traditional television and that’s part of the unique strategy.

      The original discount department store has pulled a little sophomoric potty humor out of isle ten in hopes of gaining more attention in a retail marketplace dominated by Walmart, Target and Amazon. 

Kmart’s “Ship My Pants” commercial created by DraftFCB Chicago.

      DraftFCB in Chicago has produced a brilliantly off-color and humorous message promoting Kmart’s ability to “ship my pants,” or anything else from kmart.com for free.   

      The message is very strategic.  Kmart is simply trying to regain lost customers by using humor to remind them that they don’t have to go to Amazon or Walmart to shop online. (Figure 1)

Figure 1

     The unique part of the strategy is to avoid television, and go directly to social media where edgy messaging can exceed the more sanitized boundaries of broadcast television.  It’s a messaging strategy more agencies and brands are exploiting in a multi-digital channel viral world.  In Kmart’s case, it was a brilliant success.  In the first 48-hours, “Ship my Pants” received more than two million YouTube views.

     Kmart is far from alone.  NJOY smokeless cigarettes also just scored a viral hit with Courtney Love dropping the f-bomb in an internet-only commercial that says bad girls can still be bad. 

    Several years ago, Ford didn’t have to say a word while promoting a sport version of its successful European compact car named Ka.  It targeted young urban men with an edgy internet video, the likes of which could never air in the United States.  

     Sometimes the strategy is not about being edgy, it’s about entertainment.  Turkish Airlines just achieved viral video gold with a commercial featuring two of the world’s best known athletes competing for the attention of a young fan.  The video was such a huge success that the airline created its own infographic explaining how it worked. (See below)

     Central to the strategy in all of these campaigns is the sharable functionality of social media.  Brand loyalists, followers, and viewers of these commercials who like and share the message among friends are in many respects more valuable than an expensive spot on prime time television.  In Kmart’s case, the strategy creates some opportunistic buzz for the brand at a time when JC Penney is hemorrhaging customers and every other discount retailer is still fighting for market share in the economic recovery.  

     Kmart and DraftFCB prove that creativity is still alive and well and fun… if not a little naughty. 

[Note: To keep up with more great video commercials, follow advertising savant John Eighmey]

Courtesy: Turkish Airlines

President Obama’s gun safety push presented as the lede story on the NBC Nightly News on March 28, 2013

              President Obama’s latest push on gun safety was hardly a shot in the dark.   His call for universal background checks on March 28th was a highly coordinated, multi-event, multi-channel message that offers a strategic communication model on a dynamic public policy issue.

                 With the raw emotions subsiding over the tragic Sandy Hook school shootings and the success of gun rights advocates at thwarting new legislative bans on military-style semiautomatic rifles, the Obama administration clearly needed to re-engage public opinion and build groundswell.    With little political support for banning military-style assault rifles, his new objective is keeping alive the proposal of universal background checks for all gun purchases.  The new strategy involves putting public pressure on congress.  The new tactics involved a national day of action with a highly coordinated series of events and social media engagements that would swamp news coverage and buzz in a 24-hour cycle. 

Figure 1 – Barak Obama Tweet on March 28, 2013

                 At the core of the new strategy was a White House press event featuring the victims and survivors of gun violence.  

               “Tears are not enough,” said the President. 

               He urged activists and citizens alike to “turn that heartbreak into something real” by urging their congressmen to pass meaningful gun control legislation.  By using the bully pulpit of the presidency, Obama was able to command the necessary national news coverage and earn the A-1 lede slot on the network evening news. 

Accent Signage shooting survivor John Souter speaking at a Minneapolis news conference.

                But just as important to the strategy was sending the same message to communities across the country, especially in blue states such as Minnesota and communities where gun violence is a salient issue.  In that effort the White House coordinated with gun safety organizations to hold more than 100 media events across the country that day featuring local gun violence victims pleading for action.                         

               In Minneapolis, the event featured John Souter, a survivor of the tragic workplace shooting at Accent Signage on September 27th.  Six of his co-workers died.  Souter was shot twice.   It was his first time speaking about the unspeakable.                 

                “How has it changed me?” contemplated Souter.   “I’m not the same person that’s for sure.  I don’t laugh like I used to.  These things are with you every day.”

                He commanded the attention of every news camera, every reporter’s notebook in town.  The local news conferences served as a force multiplier to the president by ensuring that local gun violence victims would be seen and positioned next to the president’s remarks in the evening news coverage.

Figure 2 –  Barak Obama Facebook post on March 28, 2013

                It was also no accident that in the middle of Souter’s emotional testimony, the Barack Obama Twitter page posted a simple message:  “Fact:  Since 1968, 1.3 million Americans have died from gun violence.” (Figure 1)                                

               The more than a half a dozen tweets were joined by Obama’s Facebook posting of an infographic showing support for universal background checks seemingly as popular at apple pie. (Figure 2)  The posting received 64,000 likes and more than 10,000 shares. 

               Likewise, the video of the president’s White House speech immediately uploaded to YouTube recieved nearly 13,000 views. (See video below)              

                By the metrics of social media engagements, earned media, and buzz, the strategy was superbly executed.    It shows that strategic engagement is no accident and it offers a modern model in multi-channel communication.   But real success in this case is whether the strategy activates votes in congress.  For the moment that is a much harder task.  The whip counts are still out.

White smoke rising from the Sistine Chapel on March 13, 2013 signifying cardinals have elected a new pope.

        In a world that communicates at the speed of light, the most important message in the universe wafted at the speed of smoke. 

         So much for the age of sophistication.

        But in that most ancient of means of communication, the smoke signals drifting from the roof of the Sistine Chapel collided with the ones and zeros that were beamed, typed, and shared around the world.   The strategic message immediately posted on the pontiff’s Twitter account @pontifex simply read, “HABEMUS PAPAM FRANCISCUM.”   The translation:  “We have a Pope Francis.” 

Figure 1

       In an instant, two memes went viral—the smoke and the Tweet.  

      Score one for the Vatican and its integrated cross-platform communications campaign.

      We now know what followed wasn’t just religious history, but also a significant milestone in social media.  Twitter analytics tracked the number of tweets about the new pope running at a frenetic pace of 130,000 a minute.  It now ranks as one of the mot shared moments in the world, second only to this year’s Super Bowl at 150,000, and nearly doubles that of the Oscars at 70,000. (Figure 1)

Figure 2

       As people watched and waited for Pope Francis to appear on the balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square, they also retweeted  the message from @pontifex to the tune of more than 54,000 times.  That’s an impressive rate of sharing, although it stands in the shadows of President Obama’s election night tweet that was shared  by more than a half a million people. (Figure 2)

       Together they show how an institution steeped in tradition, deftly and strategically used two very divergent platforms to communicate to the world one of its most important messages of the new millennium.   

TV news video app for iPad

     The spark that Guglielmo Marconi flung across the Atlantic in 1901 heralded a new world order.  From that moment forward, information transmission was forever divided between landlines and airwaves.  The past verses the future.  More than a century later the disruptive forces of technological innovation are still real—if Marconi could only see us now.

     The palm-sized computers we now hold in our hands have sparked an applications revolution that is every bit the information game-changer that Marconi ushered in with his wireless telegraph.  Just as radio led to television, computers led to the internet.  Now, mobile devices are leading to them both through applications—or apps. 

Figure 1 – ComScore U.S. Digital Future in Focus

     The growth and usage of smartphone apps is prolific and real.  ComScore’s latest analysis of internet usages shows 37% of online minutes now come from mobile devices. (Figure 1)  Furthermore, four out of every five mobile minutes are spent on an app.

     Recent mobile research by Nielsen shows the average smartphone user now has 41 apps on their device. (Figure 2)  The dominant app by usage is Facebook followed by Google Maps. 

Figure 2 – Nielsen Smartphone Usage

     Brands that that don’t embrace this new information revolution, including information providers such as news organizations, severely risk becoming marginalized in changing marketplace. 

     Sunil Gupta of the Harvard Business School has just laid out an impressive operational model for brands to build their own apps to extend their brand value on mobile platforms.   He does it by focusing on five categories:

1. Add Convenience
2. Offer Unique Value
3. Provide Social Value
4. Offer Incentives
5. Entertain

     In Gupta’s model, he’s put the consumer first.  Far too many mobile news apps I’ve seen put the information consumer somewhere else.   Tap the icon and what comes up are stories that are 24 hours old, limited video, and information cluttered with pop-up ads.  Here’s what Gupta’s model might look like if we apply it in a customer-centric fashion.

1.       Add Convenience.  Here’s where most news apps fail with outdated information.  News junkies come to you for quick and current information, therefore stories and headlines need to be constantly updated.  Post short clips of video from the stories that are appearing, even if they are from a smartphone of a reporter in the field.  ComScore’s research indicates 60% of online searches for weather forecasts are all done on mobile devices, therefore those forecasts should also be constantly current.

 2.       Add Value.  Speaking of weather, one way to add value to a weather or news app is to create an alert system for approaching severe weather.  Another value-added strategy could partner with a local transportation agency to allow the app user to track commute times along a predetermined travel route.  Also, headlines broken down by zip code.

 3.       Provide Social Value.  Here’s where the app developers could build a feature to display the latest Tweets and Facebook postings from the organization.

4.       Offer Incentives.  The app could feature built-in coupons that tie in with a promotion or sponsor.  On-screen coupons to use at live events such as food discounts at ball games would be used as a strategy to build both app users and extend on-air sales.

 5.       Entertain.  This is where the app could offer clips of behind the scenes moments from entertainment programming such as American Idol or upcoming episodes of primetime news lead-ins.

     It’s a lot of think about in an era of shrinking staff resources and budgets.  But just as Marconi once upon a time proved to be a disruptive force in information technologies, mobile devices are proving they are just as disruptive.  The signals TV stations transmit from their towers are no longer the video and information dominant structures they once were.  As digital platforms grow and evolve, information content organizations need to develop multi-platform strategies or risk becoming yesterday’s news.

                Like the flag in the old MTV promo, the way we use, watch, and access video and news is changing.  Welcome to the new m-TV—mobile television. 

                 Several new quantitative research studies suggest there is a revolution occurring before our eyes, one that consumers across two continents are literally holding in the palm of their hands.   Mobile technology and our ability to access information and share it from virtually any location may become either a disruptive force for broadcasters, or an incredible opportunity to extend content and brand value.      

Figure 1 – Pew Research Center

                Mobile devices are exploding in the U.S. marketplace.  Recent data from the Pew Research Center shows half of all U.S. adults now have a mobile connection to the internet through either a tablet or smartphone.  The results are based upon a scientific survey of 9,513 U.S. adults.  Accessing news is an important aspect what these users are consuming.  Fully 64-percent of tablet users and 62-perent of smartphone users say they use their devices to weekly to read and view news. (Figure 1)  In fact, Pew discovered that among tablet owners, news tied with email and games for the most popular activity.  On smartphones, news was second only to email.   

                For people who get news multiple times a day on their mobile devices, Pew also discovered they are more likely to turn to more sources, read more in-depth articles, and watch videos.

                This mobile video news consuming cohort represents virtually the same demographics most coveted by advertisers and television news organizations.  They tend to be young and slightly dominated by men—a many times illusive audience. (Figure 2) 

Figure 2

                This is by far not an American phenomenon.  In fact, the U.S. may be laggards compared to Europe.  Oscar Westlund’s research in the European communications journal Palabra Calve shows how mobile adoption and news consumption is far ahead of the U.S.  Sweden now has the greatest mobile penetration in the world with 101 mobile devices for every 100 people.  Westlund’s research of nearly 3,600 people reveals the early-adopters of these platforms tend to be men between the age of 15-49, and like their American cohort they are also power consumers of mobile news.  Fully 52-percent of these early-adopters use their devices for news.

                The trend is similar in Spain where the next generation of power consumers has already migrated to video news consumption.  Patricia Gonzalez Aldea’s research recently appearing in the International Journal of Iberian Studies revealed that young people haven’t stopped watching TV, they’ve only changed platforms in which they watch.

                Among the youngest group of 14-17 year olds Aldea discovered an important trend.  “They clearly prefer audio-visual media to keep them up to date with news and current affairs,” Aldea concluded.

                The findings in Spain show that the younger generation is demanding that TV content, even news, should be adapted to new platforms. 

TV news video app for iPad

                This all leads back to whether news organizations are leading the trend or following behind at their own peril.  Every credible newspaper and television news organization long ago established a presence on the web.  Many have also jumped into the world of mobile news apps.  Far fewer have stretched into the offerings of mobile video, and those which have tend to treat it as a necessary evil and not as a growth opportunity.                 

               The mobile trends and changing consumption habits demand that news organizations respond.  Television operations have an inherent advantage in m-TV given their video gathering and packaging expertise and infrastructure.  But they have to treat m-TV as a product launch, complete with a strategic business plan.

                Here’s a start:

• Identify OPPORTUNITIES based on research:
  • Size of the organization’s digital consumption universe; Size of mobile market; Penetration and strength of 4G digital infrastructure among mobile providers; Number of current video downloads; Potential viewer reach; SWOT of m-TV expansion.
• Goals:
  • Extend brand value through more mobile video content and views; Create a broader advertising base for increased revenue possibilities.
• Objectives: Measurable benchmarks
  •  50% more mobile video content in 3 months; 55% more mobile app installations in 3 months; 65% more downloads in 6 months; 80% increase in six months of audience awareness of more mobile content.
• Strategies:
  • Promote video content on web and apps; Create exclusive mobile content.
• Tactics:
  • On-air promotion of mobile apps and web video; Drive video postings through Facebook & Twitter; Produce additional content and repurpose existing content for mobile platforms; Reporters post cell phone videos to social media to drive buzz for newscasts; More timely postings of video content.
• Measurement:
  • Assess whether objectives were met.
• Contingencies:
  • What if no buy-in from employees?  What if mobile engagement doesn’t increase?  What if brand awareness doesn’t grow?  What if ad click-through rates or ad views don’t increase?

                Traditional over-the-air television and news are not going away anytime soon, but their traditional market is clearly eroding.   Both Pew and the quantitative research conducted in Europe of mobile device usage makes it clear that audiences are rapidly changing the ways and platforms in which they access traditional content.  How content providers, especially news organizations respond may very well determine who survives and who profits.

                As Oscar Westlund concludes, “Mobiles are the future.  It’s not a question of whether it will be so, but when.”

Pew Research Center Infograph

Illustration courtesy of Social Media Daily

           The social media forces that have changed and influenced television viewing habits, are now changing political engagement too.  Political communication that was once dominated by television commercials and yard signs has gone digital—and personal. 

            New research from Pew Internet reveals a significant number of Americans using social media—66%–are using social networking sites (SNS) to both follow politics and candidates and share their own political views.  

            Here are some of the top lines:

• 38% of those who use SNS & Twitter use social media to “Like” or promote material related to politics or social issues.
• 34% of social media users have used tools to post their own thoughts or comments on political or social issues.
• 33% have reposted political or social issues content that originally posted by someone else.
• 31% have encouraged others to take action on a political or social issue.

             The Pew research also indicates that the power users skew heavily young and somewhat liberal. (Figure 1)  That finding would support the explosive social media usage among viewers of the 2012 Democratic National Convention. 

Figure 1 – Pew Internet

             For television programmers, especially TV newsrooms, this latest set of data points is a gift for building strategies to engage younger viewers in way that is native and natural to them.  As television entertainment producers have built social media engagement into live viewing of comedies, drama, and reality episodes, TV news operations have the same opportunity especially when it comes to live political events such as debates, forums, and rallies.

             Some of the tactical engagement methods should include:

• Create branded discussion forums by hashtagging events for people to follow.  Example: #Fox9debates.
• Use the hashtagged comments to drive on-air discussion and talk back with guests and experts.
• Establish website chat rooms during major events that are moderated by newsroom talent. 
• On-air talent should direct viewers to specific content on the web or Facebook and encourage them to share it.

             The reality of today’s connected world is that viewers are constantly screen-splitting, meaning they’re watching TV and interacting with a mobile device at the same time.  By encouraging viewers to engage with your brand on another channel only builds the brand and helps them achieve the information and entertainment gratifications that they are seeking.  Television programmers who don’t do this risk losing their viewers to someone else who will.

             Here’s a few more important facts on the Pew Internet study. (Figure 2)  The Pew research team lead by Lee Raine interviewed 2253 adults between July 16 and August 2, 2012.   They found that 60% of American adults use either SNS or Twitter.  Of the American adults who are online, 69% use SNS such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+, and 16% use Twitter. 

Figure 2 – Pew Internet Survey Democraphics

Figure 1 – Tweets per minute during RNC & DNC

Every good marketer knows there’s a small set of essential drivers to selling a product or idea—even a candidate.  In the traditional marketing funnel there has already been plenty of awareness and product information on Barack Obama and Mitt Romney to help voters make their decision.  But one of the most important intangible drivers is what marketers call buzz.   After two weeks of heavy political showmanship, there’s some metrics which show one party and one candidate is winning the talkability battle.

In a world that is increasingly social and using digital social platforms for media and news consumption, a number of interesting patterns are occurring in the 2012 election.  First, traditional TV viewership of the conventions is down from 2008.  Second, those who are viewing the conventions are screen-splitting their attention.  That is, they’re viewing a traditional TV or streamed feed of the convention speeches and simultaneously using another screen window or mobile device to interact with and share the content they’re viewing.  It’s what 1960’s media prophet Marshal McLuhan would have called “cool” media consumption requiring the user to elaborate, process, and react.  It’s a new world, a new dynamic, and a new form of marketing buzz.

Figure 2

In this new pattern, it appears that the Democratic Party and Barack Obama have made significant gains.  Using Twitter posts as a metric for buzz, the Democrats—especially Michelle and Barack Obama—have set new heights.  In fact, Twitter reports that the 52,756 tweets per minute at the end of Obama’s acceptance speech on September 6th, set a new record.  The number of tweets on the first lady’s speech two nights before doubled those of Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech. (Figure 1)

Twitter has its own political index measuring the sentiment of tweets on the candidates.  In this metric, Obama has a 5:1 positive buzz advantage to Romney. (Figure 2)

Figure 3 – Alexa web site traffic

Another measure of buzz is the amount of traffic each candidate is attracting to his website.  Here again according to the web analytics firm Alexa, Obama is steering far more traffic to his campaign site than Romney is to his.  (Figure 3) The only metric that shows Romney with an advantage, is web searches tracked by Google trends.  During the past 30 days Romney has drawn more people to their computers searching for information on him. (Figure 4)  It’s a measure that makes perfect sense since Romney is still not as well known as the president who has spent one term in office.

Figure 4 – Google Trends for baracakobama.com & mittromney.com

While Obama is making impressive gains in social buzz, there are also critical limitations to using this as a predictor for the election.  First and foremost are demographics.  The use of social media is inherently dominated by Generation X and Millennials.   As noted in a separate post, the number of viewers to the GOP convention heavily skewed toward Baby Boomers 55 and older.  Political research tells us these are the people who actually vote.  Second, buzz is only one of many drivers a campaign needs to put its candidate in office.  From a marketing point of view, it also needs to elicit awareness, emotional bond, loyalty, and especially activation—getting their supporters to the polls.

After all, if social media buzz was the only driver that really counts, Ron Paul would be the GOP nominee.

*                *                *

(Infographs courtesy of buzzmgr.com)

Facebook post by Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola didn’t become the world’s most recognized brand by keeping the cap on the bottle.

The not-so-secret success to Coke has always been its laser beam focus creating happiness that tastes better when it’s shared.

It should therefore come as no surprise that Coca-Cola has popped the cap on another major branding success—50 Million Facebook “Likes.”   In the process, Coca-Cola offers a blueprint in how to engage brand evangelists in social media space.

Facebook post by Coca-Cola

In every respect, Facebook is the perfect match for Coca-Cola.   Coke is a brand whose core identity is about sharing and it has masterfully positioned the brand on a social platform built for sharing.  But the key to Coke’s success on Facebook is how it engages its followers—always with a question or an invitation for people to share their own ideas.

To celebrate its 50 millionth “Like” Coca-Cola has created a special Facebook app inviting followers to share their thoughts on how to improve the world.   Coke promises to select one idea early next year and contribute to the cause.

The lesson for other brands on Facebook is that the platform is not a place for corporate news or industrial relations.  It’s a space where organizations can showcase their core values and let followers engage in what it means to them.

Now… where’s my bottle cap opener? 

Mitt Romney at the 2012 Repbublican National Convention

The clicking heard across America last week was the collective sound of TV sets turning off the Republican National Convention.  But it doesn’t mean voters are necessarily tuning out, they’re just changing platforms.

The overnight television ratings from Nielsen show Mitt Romney had 8 million fewer viewers for his acceptance speech than Senator John McCain gathered in 2008.   Additionally, young voters largely didn’t watch.

Source: Nielsen

Nielsen’s data shows only 3.2 million viewers age 18-35 tuned in Romney’s speech compared with 17.5 million viewers age 55 and over—a gap of 5-to-1.   President Obama may likely see a similar erosion as the DNC gathers this week in Charlotte.

But there’s also strong evidence to show people aren’t tuning out, they’re just consuming politics in different ways.   The conventions are no longer just TV viewing events, they’re social events with hundreds of shareable moments.   And those moments are coming to news consumers where they now live—on their tablets, computers and smart phones.  It is now such an important engagement dynamic that CBS News is now tracking Twitter convention messages in a real time graphic on its politics page.

cbsnews.com politics page

At the end of Romeny’s speech on August 30^th, Twitter reports that more than 4-million Tweets were sent about the RNC.  The total nearly doubled the number from the rest of the week.  Together with Facebook, YouTube, and live streaming video they shatter the old one-way communication model of candidates shouting through a single TV camera to the masses.  In this new dynamic, people are able to talk back and have conversations with each other—even with those not watching the event on television.

In this new conversation, Twitter reports people were especially talking about the conclusion of Romney’s speech by sending out 14,289 Tweets per minute.  Clint Eastwood’s rambling unscripted attack of the president gathered the third highest score of 7,044 Tweets per minute. 

While Eastwood’s somewhat awkward empty chair metaphor became an instant internet meme, it was through social media—and not television—that President Obama had the last laugh.  His Tweet responding “This seat’s taken” was the most re-tweeted message of the entire night.

If the #foundingfathers could only see us now.

(Update – 9-5-12: Twitter reports Michelle Obama’s DNC speech gathered nearly double the tweets per minute of Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech.  One line in her speech, “we’ve got so much more to do,” gathered 22,004 tweets per minute.)

The Milwaukee Police Department’s new website milwaukeepolicenews.com

That rumble just heard in the Midwest was Milwaukee’s former Police Chief Harold Brier turning in his grave.

The tough-as-nails chief ruled Cream City’s industrial streets for 20 years with shoe leather and shear force.  But now one of his successors has added a decidedly different weapon to his belt, one that is more strategic, social, and dare I say it—entertaining.

The result just may send that rumble through cyberspace as well.

Milwaukee’s Most Wanted on milwaukeepolicenews.com

The new website just rolled out by Milwaukee Police redefines government communication.  The sleek design, easy navigation and bold 3D visual imagry effectively brands the department as crime fighters and invites the public to get involved through smart interactive content.

Scroll down the screen and the site takes the user seamlessly through calendar-based crime reports, statistics, Milwaukee’s Most Wanted, and sharable profiles of everyday heroes.

The heroes page on milwaukeepolicenews.com

According to AdAge, the website was the brain child of current Chief Edward Flynn who enlisted ad agency Cramer-Krasselt to help them create a website that people would want to visit.  The goal is to enlist citizens to “Be a Force” in their own neighborhoods by empowering them with easily accessible information about what’s happening along their own block.

The old chief in an older time would never have conceived of such a strategic communication weapon as this.  It begs every organization—government or not—to assess how many old chiefs it has stuck in the past.

Hail to the new chief.